Sunday, January 17, 2010

Traversing Torrey Valley

Ashley powering up for the traverse.We had another nice session at Torrey Valley this weekend. We warmed up on a tiny boulder behind the traverse block which was surprising good considering its size. Conditions weren't quite as warm as last session, but that gave us good friction through the crux of the traverse we started working last weekend. We both sent it after a few attempts, and then did a short moderate lip traverse going right from our starting hold.Ashley climbing the short moderate traverse. Then we did the short traverse backwards, which was somewhat more difficult. The obvious problem became adding this to the original traverse we had finished, but we were too worked to give it a good attempt. With our workout finished early in the day, I spent the rest of the afternoon traversing the valley in another way, looking at all the boulders Davin told me about. The Beck Boulders were surrounded by snow, and through the snow went a trail of large mountain lion paw prints. A little spooked, I left that area and looked at rock near the Glacier Trail trailhead on the other end of the valley.

Today was a rest day, but the weather was nice and I felt like hiking. Off the Popo Agie Falls trail I found an uncleaned boulder that has potential. Cleaning it and the landing will take work, but it's a short hike so I'll do it sometime. I found most of the boulders recently described on Davin's blog, and then hiked out of the canyon to check out a place I had spied while driving down the loop road switchbacks a couple months ago. Here's a piece of the area that has potential for a good concentration of problems. Many other boulders are spread out on gentle hillsides surrounding this spot.The sector is a bit of a hike, some of it uphill and off trail. I'd need to develop it before taking Ashley and the girls up there. Maybe I'll find someone in the Lander area that wants to work on it with me this summer.

1 comment:

David,The Full traverse (the one you did + the short one) is called The Good Earth Traverse. Smart to leave the Beck Boulders to the animals. Bad Animals is a V8 there named after a scary day with a bear. Can't wait to see the new stuff in the boulders you found! Hopefully all developed by spring :)